Andrew Weil MD - on T'ai-Chi for a better brain

Tai Chi for a Better Brain
This traditional Chinese martial art may do more than keep seniors strong, flexible and mobile. A new study from China found that practicing tai chi three times a week can increase brain volume and improve both memory and cognitive function. Researchers at Shanghai's Fudan University and a team from the University of South Florida conducted an eight-month trial comparing a group of Chinese seniors who regularly practiced tai chi with a control group that did not. The trial was the first to demonstrate that tai chi could result in improved memory and increased brain volume. Previous studies have shown that aerobic exercise can lead to an increase in brain volume, and some improvements in thinking were seen in seniors who participated in a discussion group that met three times a week. The researchers noted that gradual cognitive deterioration and dementia are associated with brain shrinkage. They said that the group that did not participate in tai chi or discussions showed a decrease in brain mass consistent with their age. The study was published June 19, 2012 in the Journal of Alzheimer's Disease. 

My take? I've long viewed tai chi as an effective exercise for both mental and physical stimulation, and I often recommend it to promote flexibility, balance, stress reduction and relaxation. This study's findings suggest that practicing tai chi can do much more for seniors. If further study reveals that it consistently leads to increases in brain volume and improvements in memory and thinking skills, it may become a core therapy to help seniors maintain their intellectual as well as their physical health.

Real life Self-Defense tips from Kelly McAnn

I thought some useful tips on SD - especially the 'hands up' to protect head and chin - the other point was the 'emotional acclimatization' from the physicality of proper training. Also his tip to 'keep your cool' was spot on. 

Remember to keep your hands up and don't let you anger get the better of you!

How to Defend Yourself | Training Tip #2: Guard Your Head

It’s essential to protect your head, face and chin in a fight. Although you can take some serious punches straight to your forehead because of the resistance provided by the musculature of the neck, you’re far less able to resist rotational force applied to your chin from either side (hook punch), obliquely (cross) or from underneath (uppercut) because your chin provides more leverage to those strikes.

Here’s a graphic visual image for emphasis: Imagine a Nerf ball with a pencil stuck in it. When you hit the ball, it moves away but doesn’t necessarily spin. When you hit the pencil, the ball spins. When you hit the pencil faster and harder, the ball moves away and spins, violently accelerating from rest to maximum spin. Make sense?

How to Defend Yourself | Training Tip #3: Keep Your Hands Up

Any striking coach knows that one of the most important first lessons is to keep your hands up and always protect your chin. Why? Well, partly because of what I just said but also because practitioners of the striking arts — in particular, boxing and muay Thai — actually hit each other. A lot. Consequently, they have to protect themselves from the very beginning of their training.

In contrast, a lot of self-defense moves initiate from a grabbing attack or from being punched at, not necessarily hit. Sure, people get grabbed on the street (“yoking” someone up), so there’s a legitimate need to know how to break grabs, but grabbing usually precedes punching by milliseconds. Besides, nobody gets knocked out solely by being grabbed.

Ever hear someone say about a fighter, “He’s got a puncher’s chance”? That means the fighter swings hard, wild and often, and he might catch his opponent on the chin, jaw or temple and knock him out. It happens all the time — one guy bends at the waist, drops his head and looks at the ground, then “swims” in at his opponent, swinging for the fences. The other guy stands tall, sways and moves straight back to get away but lifts his chin in the process and — bang! — he catches one on the jaw and drops like a stone. Oops.

You get the opposite outcome when someone swims forward but the other guy stays cool and covers, protecting his chin, then angles in and unloads an uppercut or cross to his chin. Boom! The swimmer face-plants, unconscious.

How to Defend Yourself | Training Tip #4: Keep Your Cool

Don’t succumb to your emotions when you get jumped or hit. Anger and rage are useful to fuel ferocity, to cement your resolve, but don’t lose your cool. That’s when you’re likely to forget you have a chin and need to protect it.

Can you “condition” your chin? I don’t know, and I don’t know that anyone else knows, either. There’s data to suggest strengthening your neck muscles helps somewhat — although no authoritative source is able to quantify how much or how it would affect outcomes when executing self-defense moves.

How to Defend Yourself | Training Tip #5: Use Your Best Judgment

Beware of questionable advice like “Dude, you need to take repeated shots to the head to get used to it.” Even more familiar and accepted advice like “Learn to roll with the punch” (moving away from a blow while snapping your head away to bleed off energy) is easier said than done, given how fast punches are thrown and that you probably won’t see them all.

On the street, without the benefit of headgear and gloves that effectively double the surface area of your hands when you block, you’re better off being evasive and avoiding getting hit, or covering up and putting as much mass as possible between fist and target.

Work on developing an effective, dynamic guard with similarly motivated partners. Video your practice of self-defense moves so you can identify your shortfalls. It’s a great way to avoid waking up on your back, looking up at a streetlight and wondering how the hell you got there.

A story from a former student who is studying Baguazhang in China

James studied Baguazhang at the studio for a couple of months last year - stopped when he started school last Sept. - he is now doing a year abroad and also studying Baguazhang in China. Here is an exerpt from his blog.....

"Next, we did some intensive stretching. You assume a normal stretching position, and then another student sits on your back and pushes -- hard! -- to get you to stretch farther. For one student, this meant doing the splits. He was close; he was sitting with his legs spread as far as they would go, and stretching out forwards with his forehead on the mat in front of him. I looked at him and thought, "Wow, that's pretty good." A student was sitting on his back. Then Zhang Laoshi walked over, grabbed the student's ankle, and pulled it backward -- and he let out a little yelp. Then he did the same thing with the other leg, so that his legs were now completely 180 degrees -- another yelp. But he didn't start actually crying in pain until Laoshi pushed his butt straight down into the mat, to sort of "seal the deal", one might say. He was forced to hold that position for about a minute. The other students were doubled over in laughter!

When he got up, he was smiling through his tears, though obviously still in a little pain. Laoshi said the equivalent of "jump it off!" so the student started jumping pathetically in place. It really was just like The Karate Kid!

So after that little show, I was very happy to spend the rest of the time walking slowly in a circle around a couple of boxing gloves, not moving a muscle between my knees and my waist, as he showed me. After having me practice walking forwards and backwards for a very long time, I guess he finally decided he would let me try something else."

I guess my question is how do you get people to submit to that kind of abuse?? Man, I guess they really want to learn Baguazhang!!! Wow!!!

A great story about the true use of martial arts training - Thanks Angus!

http://www.wattstapes.com/dobson.htm

Great article on balance - Thanks Reed!

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/09/16/business/retirementspecial/16BALANCE.html?src=me&ref=general